


You Are the Apple

by Northisnotup



Category: Hockey RPF, Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Drunk on a Plane, Gen, Getting Back Together, M/M, Male-Female Friendship, Multi, Multiple original characters - Freeform, Platonic Relationships, Polyamorous Character, Post-Break Up, Reconciliation, how sidney got his groove back, renovation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-25
Updated: 2019-05-25
Packaged: 2020-03-17 09:34:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18962593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Northisnotup/pseuds/Northisnotup
Summary: This is an UNFINISHED work started in 2014 which has fallen to the way-side and will likely never be completed. It features multiple OC's and the idea that Sidney Crosby needs a life.





	You Are the Apple

**Author's Note:**

> This whole crazy fic was inspired by 'Drunk on a Plane' 
> 
> A dedication note to Hazel3017, Theladyscribe, arcadeghostadventurer and macaronicap who put up with me whining about this fic for multiple years. Thank you all, I don't deserve you.
> 
> All scenes are only half beta'd and unfinished. Be warned, this is just self-indulgent character exploration and very little actual romance or relationship talk.

**(End of May 2014)**

It feels like he has been flying forever. He hasn't, but that’s what it feels like. Sid got to Morocco a week or so ago, and since then has been running around like a crazy person trying to fit in as much sightseeing distraction tactics as he can on the short break he’s allowing himself. He stuck to the eastern European coast, which was as close to Russia as he thought he should get this far into their break up. He’s hurting, maybe pining, possibly nostalgic, might have set up a google alert with Geno’s name, but he hasn’t crossed the line to crazy ex, yet. Lord help him. He’s still okay; still getting out of bed every morning and eating three meals a day and living and that has to count for something.

Yet turns out to be the optional word there, though. Sid is in the Paris airport now, a week or so of bussing and backpacking and hostels later, and it turns out all it takes for one pathetic, lonely hockey player to cross the ‘crazy ex’ line is an Arrivals/Departures board.

He could, it’s not like he’s short on cash. He could fly to Moscow. And why wouldn’t he? There’s plenty of tourism things he would love to do there. It’s a city rich in culture and history! Sid made up his mind and is attempting to convey what he wants to the only desk attendant who doesn’t speak English and wrinkles her nose up at his French when, predictably, reality checks him and hard.. He’s thought of this, fantasized about it.

Sid will land in Moscow and, what? Get a Disney worthy happy ending?

Yeah. Sure.

It was a half-baked idea when he impulse purchased the ticket to Morocco and unraveled the further north he got. He really has no excuse for it getting this far, lord love a duck, he had entire weeks to figure this out and he just, hasn’t. Somehow, Sidney still thinks he’ll get to Moscow, run into Geno’s arms like the gay version of a Nicholas Sparks novel and everything will be fine? He’s been trying to summon the courage, to find the words, for months. It’s been literal months and still he can’t just accept the fact he got left. Or dumped, rather. Left sounds vaguely mutual, like there was a chance to find whatever was wrong and fix it. But he never had that chance, Sidney didn’t get to fight for his relationship, he got dumped.

His bag lists over to the side again, a plain black, travelling backpack he traded for the carry on he usually brings with him when travelling off-season, with its unassuming gold, white and black tag. It’s sloppily packed and always leaning this way and that, with just enough clean clothes inside, thanks to the laundromat three days ago, to last him a few more days.

“Excuse me?” Sid starts at the light pressure on his bicep, the quiet English somehow jarring amid the cacophony of French and other European languages. The woman looking up at him can’t be too short, but she seems utterly dwarfed by his 5’11 frame. Her dark eyes are crinkled with worry, staring him from a face with small, sharp features. She lets her arm fall away when she has his attention, “Are you okay?”

A man by the row of vending machines calls out to her, waving at the bags piled up around his feet, but she ignores him intent on Sidney’s answer. “Yeah,” he rasps, pasting on his media smile. “I-I’m fine, sorry.” He fumbles; tongue twisting around itself attempting to convince this stranger he’s okay when he’s anything but.

Her lips twist to the side and she raises her eyebrows incredulously. She doesn’t call him out on lying, but looks like she really wants to. Her companion gives up waiting and starts walking toward them, smiling like he finds everything around him vaguely amusing. It’s very similar to how Mario smiles when he finds Sid in his guest house… again. He’s tall and pale, with thinning red hair and a big, bushy red beard. “We can’t leave our bags unattended, Kayla,” he hints, unsubtle and chuckling when she waves him off without looking away from Sid.

“Is someone coming to pick you up? Because, no offense, you look a little lost, and Paris is not a city you want to try to navigate alone.” Kayla speaks in a low even tone like you would with a dog or a baby, which is both a little offensive and a little comforting. It’s the way his mom still speaks to him when she thinks he needs something spelled out. Sid ducks his head, huffing out a little laugh. Neither Kayla nor her husband can be much older than he is, but he suddenly feels like a little kid hiding a scraped knee again.

“Babe, he’s clearly fine, I’m so sorry.” He switches his attention to Sidney, smile growing embarrassed. “She mothers everyone she meets, I swear.” He leans in to bump one of Kayla’s shoulders with his massive biceps, winking like he’s sharing the joke instead of making it over her head. Sid doesn’t question whether they know who he is, their Canadian flag pins and warm Toronto accents giving them away, but they don’t make a fuss, which is nice. Even if Sid didn’t ever think he’d be recognized in this part of the world.

“Where is your compassion, Caleb? Did you lose it? At the theater we didn’t get to go to? Or maybe you left it by our unattended bags?” Kayla clicks her tongue, shuffling her disapproving look from Sid to her husband.

He crosses his arms over his broad chest, looking like a lumberjack in his red and plaid shirt. “This is the living room drapes all over again, and if I left my concept of compassion back there, maybe it’s because I chose to bring personal space and privacy over here, where I can remind you that other people need them.”

She huffs, breaking eye contact, face becoming vaguely red as she tightens her jaw stubbornly. “Look, I don’t mean to intrude, so I’m just going to ask again and get out of your hair. Is someone coming to get you?”

“No.” Sid shakes his head, breathing deep and trying to keep his face neutral and not think about just how much he fucked up. “There’s no one.”

Kayla nods. “Okay, do you need directions to a hotel?”

“Uh, no, thanks, I’m not staying in Paris.” Where he’s going he has no freaking clue, but clearly he can’t be trusted to stay in Europe alone anymore.

“Okay,” Kayla nods again, “when’s your flight out? Parisian French isn’t so different from Quebecois that I can’t read it.” She jerks her chin at her husband, and this is something Sid understands a bit more, long standing but never resolved arguments. Couples arguments.

“I never said that,” Caleb says serenely.

“You might as well have,” she snaps back.

“Yes, but the important thing is, I didn’t.” Caleb leans down a ridiculous amount to kiss her on the cheek, and Sid has to wonder, can’t not, if this is what their friends saw when Geno would kiss him. He liked their friends knowing, liked being able to put his arm around Sid’s shoulders or his hands on Sid’s waist and not have a big deal made of it. Sid did too, though he sometimes got the feel that Geno wanted more. He did, does want more, obviously because if he didn’t Sid wouldn’t be in Paris in the first place. He wouldn’t have run away from the house that had remnants of their shared lives strewn about like a coward. He wouldn’t have had to tell Mario that they broke up, wouldn’t have had to tell Flower or Duper or the rest of them that it was going to be fine, everything would be normal after the summer. No one pressed Sid for details, thankfully. Sid might have had to admit his relationship was over, but for once his pushy, stubborn friends left it at that. He never had to admit out loud how Geno drew back after Sochi. The eggshell walking, the ugly text messages and stilted conversations, and how Geno left for Russia nearly immediately after they got knocked out of the playoffs without saying good bye. That the break Sid thought was just a break was a break-up and he found out through fucking Deadspin, blurry pictures of Russian clubs and Russian women and Geno. They said nothing about it beyond the requisite: ‘You guys’ll be okay next season, right?’ Because that’s something new too, they have to still be friends or at least teammates after this break. So Sid has to get over this, somehow. He takes a shaky breath, swallowing past the tightness in his throat. “Um, is there a flight leaving soon, to Canada?”

Kayla’s dark eyes swing between the board overhead and him a few times as she chews on her bottom lip, toying with a piercing that Sid honestly didn’t even notice she had. “Well, our flight is coming in in three hours, to Toronto, beyond that they say there’s this big storm delaying most flights.”  Well fuck. Toronto’s not bad, if he can get a ticket. Toronto to Halifax is only another three hours or so, and beyond that he still has to fly back to Pittsburgh for manager meetings and to New York for publicity things. “Okay, I’m not trying to overstep or come off as a crazy fan or anything, but, you really look like you could use a beer. If you want you could meet us in the airport lounge?”

He grimaces a little, automatically looking for merch or a camera in a way that has Kayla rolling her eyes, stepping back and placing one finger, dramatically, on her Canadian flag pin. “I, Kayla Singer, being of sound mind and body, do so solemnly swear not to be a fucking narc upon pain of death.”

“Oh my god.” Sid gapes, shaking his head incredulously as she openly laughs at him, because she’s serious. Totally and completely serious. The exact way Duper is when making promises to his kids, though his promises usually involve suckers and he never intends to keep them. Sid is not the type of person to sit down with strangers and drink. He doesn’t even like making nice with the bartenders or the girls that flock to the tables on team nights out. Nothing personal, he’s just a lot more comfortable hanging out with people he knows, and he doesn’t know these two, but. Sighing out a huge gust of air he decides in much the same way he did a week ago: fuck it. He’s alone in Paris. He barely knows what day it is, and his agents are going to drag him to hell when he gets back anyway. She hasn’t asked for his autograph, hasn’t done anything more than recognise him and ask if he is okay — he could really use a fucking beer.  “You know what, that sounds amazing.”

She nods once, making the decision for all three of them by starting to walk away, ignoring Caleb’s repeated protests. “I’m going through security, and then getting a beer and you two can join me whenever you’re done exhausting your Canadian politeness,” she calls, and then, with smooth deliberate motions telegraphing what she’s doing, she takes two small pale-flesh tone things out of her ears. Hearing aids. Jesus, Sid used to notice all sorts of things about beautiful women, when they changed their perfume, or got their hair done, bought new earrings; noticing things is his job. And maybe he’s just tired and sunburned and off his game, or the recycled air and fluorescent hum of the airport is messing with him. Maybe he’s been getting worse and not better, his concussion never fully healed and he’s losing out on details that used to be second nature. Maybe what he needs is to go back in time, to have stayed in Nova Scotia and trained, like he was supposed to instead of indulging in piteous emotional wallowing.

“I’ll tell you right fucking now,” Caleb mutters, east coast accent flickering across his words, turning you into ‘ya’ and mashing words together in a way that makes Sid smile helplessly. There is nothing like a Maritimer to make him miss home. “That woman’ll drive me to drink.” He’s got two hands buried in his hair, tugging the wispy strands almost contemplatively. He glances at Sid, the curling edge of his mouth nearly losing his thin lips to his beard. “But she’s a good sort. Please, don’t feel like you need to indulge her though.”

Sid ducks his head, fighting a war to cover the hot back of his neck but also to keep his hands firmly in the safety of his pockets. “Uh, no, she was kind to ask, really.” Even if she didn’t ask so much as offer and walk away. “Your wife seems like a very determined woman.”

“Oh, she’s not my wife. She’s my friend Amal’s wife.” He grins, the sort of knowing-something-you-don’t grin that Geno used to aim at him when he spoke to his parents on the phone, but missing the familiar tongue-in-teeth cheekiness. It’s somewhat reassuring that Sid only wants to punch that grin a little bit now. “She’s just my girlfriend.”

He outright laughs at Sid’s sputtering flustered attempt to backtrack, picking up their bags and Sid’s both and steering him gently back toward the ticket counter. “Don’t worry, we generally use the ‘it’s complicated,’ tag on facebook.”

Kayla has three tall, sweating glasses of beer sitting in front of her, each one a different colour and each one untouched. “Thank you for joining us, uh, Mr. Crosby? Sidney?” she winces, waffling awkwardly between formalities, her confidence seemingly smothered now that he is actually across from her.

“You bought me a beer, call me Sid.”

Which is how, three hours, eight beers, an untold amount of funny stories, personal anecdotes and pictures of children both related and semi-related later, Sid is poured into his seat flying direct from Paris to Toronto knowing so much more about Kayla and Caleb Singer, not married, no relation and telling Kayla about how after winning gold in Sochi, the Canadian men's hockey team bought, begged, bribed, and blackmailed their way into getting an entire Burger King's worth of burgers and fries delivered to them. It took an hour. The burgers were cold, greasy and to this day the best thing he’s ever tasted.

**(June 2014)**

Sid buys a house. That’s not the first thing that happens when he flies back into Pittsburgh. But it is the most important thing that happens. He buys a house and then he calls Kayla. Which is only a surprise to Sid, himself. Normally he would have left it at talking to a seatmate over some tiny bottles of terrible alcohol. But — Jack’s got his own bullshit to take care of and Sid doesn’t want to add his drama on top of that. He doesn’t feel like he could text Paulie or Nealer anymore because they’re more Geno’s friends than his and the last thing he wants is teammates feeling they need to pick ‘sides.’ Duper and Flower have families and lives of their own and Mario gets this line in his forehead anytime Sid even thinks about his break up.

Honestly, he just wouldn’t feel comfortable talking to anyone on the team, they’re Geno’s team too; it’s not fair to unload this crap on them. So…He started texting Kayla. And then calling. And then skyping.

Mario isn’t thrilled about that either, judging by the way his mouth flattens into a thin, tight line when Sid’s phone rings or how often Nathalie makes meatloaf. Meatloaf is her ‘I’m worried about you,’ food. But Kayla swore a “Canadian Beer Oath,” not to tell the tabloids and that’s held up so far. For all that she made it up on the spot.

Taylor is about the only person who doesn’t think it’s weird. He tells her about the crazy conversations he has with Kayla and the easy way they talk about everything and nothing, worrying a little about how fast it’s all happening and how much he’s coming to rely on her. If platonic relationships can be ‘fast.’ Taylor just thinks he’s dumb for overthinking making friends. (But tells him it’s understandable, given that he’s never had friends who weren’t assigned to him, which is more fair that Sid would like to think, being honest) She advises him to ‘shut up and enjoy (his) new BFF, weirdo.’

Though the biggest and most important reason they’re friends is that when he calls, at any time, Kayla picks up. Sometimes she can’t talk for long and sometimes she tells him to call back, but she answers. That’s something Sid’s never had in his life before. Not with someone who isn’t his mom or Taylor, because hockey is a full time career. When not playing, there’s training and then there are significant others, hobbies, pets, those take up a good portion of time. Friends on different teams in different time zones, with different routines might get to email a couple times a month or so. Texting is a little more likely. Even when he was with Geno, Sid never considered their relationship to be the on/off variety (no, of course not, he was too busy convincing himself it was the forever variety. Fucking stupid) but now, looking back with 20/20 hindsight, it was so clearly off every time Geno went home for the summer. When Sid would get sporadic, mostly drunk texts or pictures of Geno with other peoples animals and he would never call or skype and when Sid missed him so much he threw himself into training.

He left Toronto with Kayla’s number in his phone, never really intending to call her. But his house, (now his old house) finally finished, was drafty and huge and echoed, and there was the box of Geno’s stuff; sweaters, froofy ties that Sid wouldn’t touch, various equipment and movies, cans of tea and the finicky bbq tongs that Geno whines if he doesn't have, all packed up. He’d been willing himself to drop it off all the way up to the point he booked the ticket and got on the plane to Morocco.

Honestly, it’s pretty lucky that all he did was drop the stuff off with Geno’s dog walker and sell that house immediately.

Another surprise for no one but Sid, the place sold quickly. He had to scramble to pack what little he’d moved in and find a place so as not to move back in with Mario. Not that he wouldn’t be welcome, but it felt too much like what he’d been doing. Like he was still running and hiding. And so, Sid sat in the shitty, pre-decorated apartment he short-term rented while he listlessly thumbed through his contacts thinking of anyone who might pick up this late into the evening on a Tuesday and wouldn’t mock him ruthlessly for being lonely.

He pressed the call button, and she picked up. It’s really that simple.

Or it was, until Sid — well, he got a little impulsive, and bought a house.

He bought a house and then called Kayla. Because that’s what he does now.

It’s big and empty and dirty and outdated and he loves every dusty, clashing, retro inch of it.

“I bought a house.” He blurts the minute the phone line picks up. The house. The dream home. The one he fell in love with and coveted months and months ago when it first went up on his realtor’s website. The one he pined for after they got knocked out of the playoffs and he went home, alone, to a house that felt no different from the hotel he just left.

He’s already started making list of things to buy and the materials he needs and he’s pretty sure the contractors that Jordy started researching while he was here are still in business.

“Is this Sidney?” a cool voice that is absolutely not Kayla’s answers him, sounding faintly smug.

“Oh, uh, yeah, sorry. Is this a bad time? I can leave a message or call back.” He stutters, automatically shifting into what Taylor calls his Business Sid voice. This is not the impression Sid wants to make on Kayla’s wife, not after everything he’s heard about her. Everything she might have heard about him.

“Just let me get her for you.” He doesn’t think he’s imagining the smirk in her voice, Sid’s talked to enough smarmy rich people to know amused-condescension when he hears it. (Not that Kayla can’t be condescending, but she does it in an almost thoughtless way. A caring way. A ‘what did you eat for lunch, and when did you eat it, yes I know you’re an adult but I worry,’ type of way.)

The line buzzes before beginning to echo slightly and when Kayla speaks there is the soft mumbling of a TV and the harsher shriek of a child’s laughter behind her. “Hey sweetie, you’re in my ears. What’s up?”

He fights a wince, hating when Kayla patches him through her hearing aides. But it’s the easiest thing for her to help him be clear when lip reading isn’t an option.

“Um, I bought a house?” The floors are too dirty to take his shoes off and the tap-tap-tap of his rubber soled shoes fills the silence as he wanders from sun-drenched room to sun-drenched room. “I bought _the_ house.”

“Didn’t you just finish that place you’ve been building for literal years?” Kayla clicks her tongue a couple times, lippy and obnoxious as Caleb sighs loudly, so near she must be leaning against him. Or he is also being obnoxious for effect. “Is it weird I read your press? I feel as though I should apologize for that.”

Sid shrugs even though she can’t see him. “I mean, I guess one of us should?”

“Hmm. Anyway, why did you buy a house?” She continues to make encouraging but non-committal responses when he stumbles through trying to find something to say that isn’t too honest or pathetic.

“I just—” _hate it._

“I couldn’t—” _be there anymore._

“It was supposed to be—” _an us house._

It was an open floor plan; neutral toned, stainless steel and white light, modern-architecture monstrosity was what it was. And while Sid likes some of those things, it’s not untruthful to say he chose most of them with Geno in mind. So that maybe, at the end of the season or at the end of their careers, he would have enough things that Geno liked that he might just stay. With the chrome bathroom fixtures and Steeler’s yellow backsplash tile in the kitchen and the pillars by the back entry way and with Sid.

“I got dumped.” It rushes out of him the same way, ‘I bought a house,’ did when the phone picked up. Quick and unbidden, like it had been sitting on the tip of his tongue, waiting.

“Yeah,” Kayla sighs apologetically, “I figured it might be something like that. You’ve been a little all over the place, sweetie.”

Sid pauses, frowning, “Did you make a geography joke after I told you I got dumped?”

“No!” Kayla yelps, and then says “but that would have been great, wouldn’t it?”

Sid laughs, lightly and not as bitterly as he thought he would, admitting that yeah, it would have been funny, and is grateful all over again for Kayla being who she is. She says something pithy about Carmen Sandiago, replies to a comment he can’t hear, probably from Amal and successfully segues them into telling worse and worse jokes about places they’ve been or heard of.

“Hey,” Kayla clears her throat a little awkwardly, attempting to be serious while still giggling over the awful pun based on Istanbul. “you know, if you want to talk about it…”

“No! I mean, yeah I just. I can’t, you know. He isn’t out and I...can’t.” Sid winces, biting down on his stumbling tongue until he feels the words will come smoother. “We have friends in common so I can’t really put this on anyone, you know? That’s not fair.”

“I don’t know him. I’m not his friend.” Kayla points out, not skipping a beat on the pronoun use. “I am five hours away by car, you can bitch ‘til your heart's content if you want sweetie. I’m serious,” she says firmly, warming up to the idea. “Get a bottle of wine and start trash talking. Let’s do this.”

“Thanks Kayla.” Sid blows out a long breath, nose itching with dust and fingers toying with the keys in his hand. The light makes the house seem endless and open, full of all the things he wants to do with it already. “Whoa, I bought a house.”

“You bought a house!” She enthuses back, easy with the topic change.

Kayla badgers him over the next few days into setting up a blocky stutter-start facetime tour and starts cataloguing things for him to fix or change. Really, he should have known better. But he’d talked about this house, the much coveted dream home on the plane. Half-way to too drunk and rapturing about the floors and the layout and the ‘old world charm’ and the warmth and then she’d joined in, latching on to floor plans and tile colours and paint choices. He’d said something about her being a fellow HGTV junkie, and she replied: “No, I’m a designer, this is what I do!” which made him laugh so hard he’d nearly thrown up, because of course.

Of course Sid meets someone, get along famously with them and then it turns out they work in a career he detested on principle for the last few years of building the hell-house.

This is his forever home, he knows that deep in his bones. Sid’s new home is not a gut job. The very last thing he wants to do is knock down and rebuild walls that are perfectly fine expecting the need of a fresh coat of paint. But According to Kayla, the kitchen needs to be updated and the floors need refinishing and who the hell touched that bathroom? Thanks to whoever that was they will definitely need to rework the plumbing and hey, if all of that is being done anyway, those light fixtures aren’t original to the period, let’s get those switched out!

Thankfully, between Sid’s ironclad convictions against gutting and his contractors assessment, they have since managed to steer her away from pulling down plaster to just small cosmetic changes; like new paint and changing the banisters to match the hardwood floors.

Kayla, in return and possibly in revenge, talked him into being much more involved in the process of this home than any of his last ones.

Putting down his paintbrush, Sid feels his jaw crack, the little clicking noises that have been annoying him since he broke it, with the yawns he’s been holding back since starting the small spot fixes on the crown molding. He stretches his shoulders, willing them not to ache so badly that he can’t finish touching up the dining room too.

“Do you ever think about how we’re friends because we got drunk on a plane?” Kayla’s voice over skype is tinny and higher pitched than usual and has the awful habit of periodically sounding like she’s far away.

“Are we friends? Cause if we are, we’re friends because you’re overbearing and a mother hen.” He corrects, mostly teasing, wishing he hadn’t taken her word on the paint choice and had put up a swatch, like HGTV keeps telling him to. It’s not that he doesn’t like the jewel blue accent wall with the off-white-closer-to-gray around it, or that it looks like ‘too much’ in the sunlight, but more that he has no idea if it’ll pair well with the re-finished oak flooring with it’s fresh dark stain.

She scoffs, the sound reverberating through his still empty house. It is less empty now, filled with building materials and sanding machines and big garbage bags waiting to be put in the dumpster in the driveway. “Okay, first of all of course we’re friends don’t even with me, and second I am helping—”

“Helping?” Another voice cuts in over the line, full of loving derision. Sid smiles widely; it has since been decided that he and Amal aren’t allowed to talk without a buffer anymore. The last time they may have gotten into an hour long debate, and Sid maintains it was a heated debate not a wall-shaking argument, about whether you can use cool and warm tones in the same room. Now she mostly tags along when Kayla skypes him and they make Caleb take care of the twins. It works, mostly.

Kayla talks over the comment, used to Amal’s mean brand of teasing; probably the same way Sid got used to chirps sliding off his back. “ _Helping_ you decorate your new place, so I hate to break this to you, but I’m not just your friend, I’m a very good friend, you control freak. And,” She adds smugly, “we’re friends because I noticed you being very bad at speaking French, and got you drunk on a plane.” Well, she’s not wrong.

“So how are we transitioning from cool blue-gray in the living room to the warm taupe-gray in the dining room? Does that even work?” He grumps, more to have something to say than anything, ignoring the continuous buzzing of his phone in his pocket. It’s probably just Mario, and he’ll understand. Or maybe Tazer, he’s been calling more often. Sid’ll get him back in an email soon, when the kitchen is done and he has some more free time.

“You have a closed concept home, Sidney, the gray is a beautiful transition color working with warm and cold tones.” Amal says in a snotty tone of voice that conveys both patience and loving condescension. She’s not making fun of him though; she’s mimicking Kayla who has said that exact same sentence, verbatim, to Sid at least thirty times. (Though she calls Sid ‘sweetie,’ whereas Amal never uses less than his full name.)

Before Kayla can retaliate, Amal picks up their laptop and swings him through their suburban Toronto home into the kitchen, where Caleb is trying to get two uninterested three year olds to finish their macaroni. She’s unsubtly reminding him it’s lunchtime so he can break before he starts on painting the formal dining room.

“Why am I doing this myself again?” Sid lifts his own iPad up and drags himself to the kitchen, untouched for now in all its eye-wateringly ugly brown and orange 1970’s glory where his lunch box sits. “Aren’t I paying contractors for this?”

Caleb pulls back from making a face at Cagney, trying clean off spit and processed cheese from her dirty fingers while she’s distracted by Sidney appearing on camera. “Well, you said you wanted this place to be yours, not your designers. Which means you make the decisions and you do the work.” He shrugs, aiming one of his easy smiles at Sid before leaving the camera frame, switching places with Amal near effortlessly at this point. Their kitchen is messy but inviting, and they share it well, bumping into each other companionably and sharing space like nothing. It’s nearly too easy to be envious of what they share.

He takes a vicious bite of his sandwich, chewing the thick multigrain bread, crisp veggies and cold cuts that he slapped together that morning. “Yeah, I know.” Sid smiles, less sunnily than Caleb did and looks around, letting their static-y home-noises be a pleasant background to plan his own kitchen to.

Sid’s done well with all the renovations so far, helping where he can and staying out of the contractor's hair in equal measure. Three weeks in and it’s rewired and the floors, basement and living rooms are nearly done. He hangs his head, smile losing it bitterness and growing with pride, it feels a lot more like his home — fighting with Kayla on the colours and choices and having done some of the painting. It’s clearly his in a way that Mario’s place, which was like living with his dad, and his old house, which was like staying at ikea, and Geno’s place, which was never really his at all, were not. He hasn’t told the team about it yet, they’d make a big deal of him selling the old place just as it was ‘finished’ and want to see and touch and get gifts and Sid can’t share this like that. Not yet.

**(July 2014)**

“Where the fuck are you?” Flower demands, talking right over Sid’s greeting. He frowns, but doesn’t give into the urge to check the caller ID to make sure he’s right. He was expecting Hedley, the lead contractor, not Flower. He must be back in town for a week of meetings or something. “Cause according to Duper, Geno, Kuni, and hell, even Tazer, no one’s heard from you all freaking summer Sid.”

Taking a few even breaths through his nose, Sid has to work to put the sledgehammer down easily and not swing through the piece of cabinet he is currently taking down. “I’m at home, Flower.” He says haltingly, forcing himself not to snap. He’s not Geno’s responsibility anymore and Flower knows that. He knows. Sid told them, just like he’s sure Geno told his friends that they broke up, not that he needed to with Geno’s fucking face plastered all over the web making out with random girls in bars all summer.

“No,” The bastard has the nerve to sound cheery. “No, you aren’t ‘at home,’ because that’s where Mario said you were and that’s where I just got kicked out of by the people who apparently live there now. So, where are you?”

“Oh, I uh, got a new place.” Sid looks warily around his half-demolished kitchen, inanely wishing he had more to show for the weeks of work. He’s getting the old cabinetry out of the way now so the contractors who are in tomorrow can start their work that much earlier. According to Kayla it’s cheap, easy work that even amateurs can do without fucking up too badly. And there are sections of the floor that needs to be replaced due to water damage anyway, so it’s not like he has to worry about being careful cause he isn’t keeping the originals.

“Great! What’s the address?” Sid winces away from the phone when it buzzes obnoxiously in his hand, unthinkingly rattling off the new address up to the postal code before Flower hangs up on him. Okay, so, he really shouldn’t check that message, because it’s undoubtedly Kayla.

In all fairness, she’s just continuing the thread of conversation he started, he literally asked for it, asking her to text him hurtful questions about his last relationship. Things he can use to work out his anger and bitterness on the cabinets and get it out of his system before Summer ends and he is confronted face to face with the ghost of happy endings past.

He should not look at his phone. Absolutely not. He doesn’t need to see the banner across his screen saying: _How long was it between his last ‘I love you,’ and breaking up with you?_

Two days. Well, three weeks with the full ‘I love you,’ whispering it into Sid’s hairline before the last time they slept in the same bed; but a pet name, or a message left on his fridge, or a heart emoji? Two fucking days.

He gets the rest of the cabinets down and destroys a good chunk of counter top before attempting to tap out his reply. After deleting three long angry responses, he settles on _Ouch :( :(_

_Ahhh I’m sorry was that too mean???_

_Little bit, upside: the cabinets are all down._

_Atta boy <3!_

“Jesus Sidney!” Flower’s voice echoes loudly through the draped over foyer and den, reminding him how much space he still has to finish and fill. “I didn’t think you would sell one fucking mansion just to buy another!”

Sid scowls reflexively, it’s not a mansion. It’s just an old colonial built in 1904 by the previous owners’ grandparents. They actually did a whole bunch of renovation on the exterior of the place a couple of years before. New brick, new cement and pipes below ground, it was impressive what the old woman who sold it to him got accomplished. “In the kitchen, Flower!” he calls back, kicking a stray piece of splintered wood.

“Yeah, which one? Is it through the servant’s quarters or…Holy shit,” Flower says blankly, taking in the mess of cabinetry and countertop. “Sid, holy shit. When did you find this?”

Sid shrugs, grabbing his first load of wood to toss in the industrial dumpster in the driveway. “It went up a few months ago, but we just finalized when I got back from Paris.” He hears the choked off noise Flower makes, but doesn’t look at his face when he walks through maze of tarps, painting tape and tools.

“Sidney,” Flower follows him to and from the kitchen, taking his time with whatever cutting thing he wants to say as gently as he can. “How much work have you done here?”

“Myself? Or with the contractors?” Sid grabs a broom and starts sweeping to have somewhere to look besides Flower and his ‘I’m disappointed with you and your life choices’ expression. “They did most of the work, really. I was, uh, lucky, I guess to find them. They specialize in restoration of historical houses which is pretty much exactly what this place needs. They’re trying to find something similar to the current bathroom tile, which I’ve been told was imported from Italy in 1900, for the backsplash right now. So, I decided to get the old stuff out of the way for them, that way they can just get right to work tomorrow. Right?”

“Right,” Flower says distractedly, sliding his phone out of his pocket faux-causal. “You want pizza?”

Nope. Cheese and grease are not on his diet plan and he’s about to say so when he thinks of everything he still has to do to get the house livable, and dealing with Hedley and his guys in Sid’s space and hey, he’s been a lot more socially active this summer than many previous years so…

He’s kind of earned it.

He’s totally earned it. “Yeah, okay.” Expecting Flower to not be a total dick and at least get vegetables.

And to be fair to Flower, pizza does show up and it does have vegetables. But he also, because he’s a douche canoe, calls Duper. And Duper brings wine, because he’s a cheat.

This is how Sid spends his first night in his new house, sitting on tarps in the ground floor solarium, drunk off his ass and whining about his break up. Because this is his life, apparently.

It takes a full bottle, or four glasses before he’s ready to talk about Sochi. “There was so much pressure on him, too much. Like, Vancouver times a million. You know, they interviewed his parents and then ambushed him with it, who does that?” Sid takes a gulp of the chilled white Duper started them on. A dangerous semi-sweet wine that tastes and drinks like juice.

One and a half bottles in, Sid’s six cups to Flower and Duper’s two each, he talks about how they didn’t talk about it. Fuck Gwyneth Paltrow and her ‘conscious uncoupling,’ bullshit. It was like the complete opposite of that, more like the harder Sid tried to get close and talk about it and fix it the less Geno wanted to hear.

Two and a half bottles in, moving to a tannin heavy red that Sid would probably appreciate more if he wasn’t well on his way to sloshed and Sid admits, hushed, that he’d been counting anniversaries and milestones and didn’t stop to think that they weren’t on the same page. “God, I’m such an asshole, I was thinking, _moving in_ and _kids_ and he was thinking _you’re convenient_.”  Flower makes a noise of protest that prompts Sid to cut him off, waving his hands desperately. “No! Not that, like — that’s not his fault. Two way street, I get it. I’m bad at people and I shouldn’t have expected him to step up. That’s on me. It just sucks.”

Uncorking bottle three, he crows: “At least I was a fucking adult about it. I just returned his shit and gave him space and didn’t slut myself around half of Europe.” Only to take it back five minutes later and wish Geno all the happiness in the world with whatever tiny, blonde, Russian girlfriend he brings back. Sid will meet her and smile and bring great gifts to their wedding. Maybe he’ll buy her a car.

Finally the last of the wine is gone and Sid is shaky and so, so drunk, sitting in the big, opulent house that, gosh, he loves so much but is going to be so lonely in. House, because it’s not a home yet. It’s got all these things that he picked and fought for and loves in that way you love things—objects. But it isn’t home and it might not ever be home, because maybe what was wrong with his last house wasn’t the distant, mass produced art on the walls or the chrome fixtures or the cold light instead of warm. Maybe it was him, is still him. He might as well just move back in with Mario and let the world guess at what a lonely, broken person he is. He is going to die alone because he is an awkward, selfish person incapable of understanding emotions. Only his cats will miss him.

Too bad he doesn’t have cats.

“I should get cats.” Sid mumbles wetly into Duper’s shoulder, toying with his saved conversations. He likes that about the iPhone Taylor talked him into buying; he doesn’t have to specifically save messages or emails. They’re always kept, forever. So if he really wants to, he can go back and read the last forty texts Kayla sent him, or see the blurry pictures of Sam his mom took over the summer, or the texts from Tazer that he really has to sit down and reply to someday.

“A cat? You don’t like cats.” Flower waves a slice of cold pizza in his general direction.

Sid scowls back, expending a lot of effort, possibly too much effort, to get his face out of Duper’s shoulder. “No, cat-sssss. You can’t be a crazy cat lady with one cat. Then you’re just a guy with a cat.”

“You can’t be a crazy cat lady because you have a dick.” Flower says sagely, like he’s won.

“Don’t be a transphobe, man.” Sid scowls, “If you can play, you can play. You don’t know my life.” Ha ha! That’ll show him.

“Get up, breakfast, training, housework, lunch, housework, training, dinner, sleep. Rinse, and repeat.” Duper snorts dryly, grabbing Sid’s phone from his wine-clumsy fingers and thumbing through it. Sid opens his mouth to say something, maybe try to get his phone back, but stops, cause, yeah. With the addition of calling Kayla a lot, that’s pretty much been his life since he got back to Pittsburgh. And without Kayla and the reno, that’s been his life for the past few years, and that’s sad. He’s never really thought of his life as empty before, he’s never had to, he had hockey! Has hockey, why does he need anything else? Hockey is all he’s ever wanted to do, and it’s not like he gave up much to do it, sure he didn’t get to like, try every instrument in band until he found one that felt right, or spend days re-writing something until the words fit, or knit a sweater, or taken an engine apart just to see how it fits together. He has hockey, but it’s never felt like a consolation prize before. Duper’s arm, where it’s thrown over his shoulders buddy-like, tenses. “What’s this?”

“Hm?” Sid glances at the phone, eyes heavy with the day and the carbs and the alcohol. Ah. Fuck. He should not have saved the Deadspin article. That was shitty of him. He’ll delete it, he will, come morning. Geno deserves better. He deserves a beautiful Russian wife who won’t make his parents cry on national sports media and who will give him tons of beautiful Russian children who will play good hockey.

“Sidney…” Flower murmurs, his eyebrows crinkled up like they only ever do when they’re going into the third and the whole game depends on him. “You should have called us, we could have helped with, uh, with, all this.” He finishes lamely. Sid looks back from him to Duper a couple times, neck loose and muscles fluid in a way the probably looks ridiculous but feels great. They look way more upset than is called for, really. It’s not like Sid’s not dealing, not like he’s drunk all the time and piteously reliving the past and pining and freaking out or anything. He’s fine, he’s always fine. But the way they’re looking at him, like someone kicked a puppy and then left it on the side of the road and it got taken to the SPCA but no-one wants to adopt it is like. It just screams at every habit, learned or instinctive, that he has.

 

Work harder, Sidney.

 

You’re letting everyone down, Sidney.

 

People are counting on you, Sidney.

“Yeah, okay.” He nods, attempting to sit up so he’s not leaning on Duper. “I can be better. I will be better. It’s okay.” He gives what he hopes is a reassuring smile. Whatever he has, or hasn’t been doing clearly hasn’t been enough, if the guys are worried. So, he’ll have to do more. Shit, he should text Tazer. Jonny gets at least as much shit, if not more than Sid for not being a ‘real boy,’ maybe he can help. The Singers can definitely help, Kayla is the realest person he knows. She has a big, diverse group of friends and interests. Granted, she’s talked about how she misses them since work picked up and the girls are getting bigger, but—

Flower starts saying something, but cuts himself off with an obnoxiously loud yawn. “Shit, okay. We will continue this. Tomorrow. Come on.” When they all stand, Sid almost falling into Flower when he tries to walk, he finally understands why his glass was always so full; and stares at sober as a judge Duper with wide, betrayed eyes. Which is all he really remembers.

He wakes up blurry and in pain, sprawled across the guest bed in Duper’s house. Accompanying Sid’s prone body is a rattling bottle of painkillers somewhere around his hip, pajama bottoms wrapped around his left ankle, like he tried to kick them off in the middle of the night and three bottles of Gatorade in different colours. His phone is mashed into his cheek uncomfortably like he was attempting to call someone…

Mortification flashes hot down his spine making him moan into the cool cotton sheets. Oh please let it be Kayla. Hesitantly, he checks the display, sensibly dimmed because drunk Sid is apparently a genius. Kayla has sent him twelve text messages in response to one he sent at 3:45 am.

 _Things to fo thtt aren’t ny house: GO!_ Read 6:15 am

_Things to do* that* aren’t your house?? Okay._

_Umm, see every movie that comes out_

_Go to the library and fully read through the first series you see_

_Join a bookclub_

_(maybe? Idk are you too famous fo that?)_

_Take lessons of some sort (et: cooking, French, music…)_

_Go to the park and people watch_

_Write a book_

_Wait you’re too famous to write, have someone ghost-write you a book_

_WAIT DON’T GO TO THE PARK_

_CHILDREN PLAY THERE_

_I DON’T WANT TO READ THAT DEADSPIN ARTICLE_ Sent 6:25 am

Sufficiently relieved he hadn’t drunk texted something ridiculous to someone important, he thumbs to his recent calls. None outgoing from yesterday. Perfect. That is an upside, a positive Sid can focus on. Blindly, Sid reaches for some of the Gatorade, coming up with the white G2, which, while it’s not his favorite, is vastly superior to the yellow G1. He takes a couple painkillers and is about to try to get some more sleep when his alarm deems it fit to ring obnoxiously.

Drunk Sid is not a genius. Drunk Sid is an asshole. He may have dimmed the screen, but he left the ringer on the loudest setting.

Minutes or hours after he flung his phone away, he hears the hinges on the door squeak, and bare feet smacking softly on hardwood. “Sid, are you still alive?” Flower whispers off-kilter and sounding as hung over as Sidney feels. He manages to grunt an affirmative, dragging the comforter back so Flower can crawl in beside him.

“I’m so sorry for last night. God, what did I even say?” Sid moans, pressing the Gatorade bottle to his face, it’s room temperature but even that feels cool to his embarrassment-hot cheeks.

There is a pause, a long awful pause before Flower speaks. “Nothing important. Don’t worry, just break up junk.” He says lowly, voice going sharp on the consonants like he wants to be speaking French. He’s clearly taking pity on Sid, who couldn’t be more grateful for the absence of teasing.

It’s Sid’s turn to lapse into silence, pulling himself up on aching arms to lean against the headboard. “I’m sorry,” he says again instead of anything else that wants to come spilling out. He feels young and stupid in a way he hasn’t since that disastrous interview after the Flyer’s game. These aren’t just his friends, they’re his team and his responsibility, and he should have never put them in that position. “It wasn’t just mean and whiny, it was unprofessional and I’m sorry. Geno is still your friend and he’s still got the A.”

“Hey, hey, no.” Flower swats a bottle out of the way, squirming across the giant mattress so he can press his shoulder into the dip of Sid’s waist. It might not be the most comfortable position, but it reminds him of their Cup celebration, waking up on the floor of Mario’s guest house in a pile of his teammates. Talking quietly, still drunk off of champagne and success, to Flower in the early morning over Kuni’s head and Army’s legs. “You’re allowed to feel shitty and tell your friends you feel shitty. Okay? You should have called us first, y’know, before you swanned off to fucking France to indulge your manpain.”

Sid snorts quietly, nudging Flower over until he can flop back into the bed turning the words he wants to say over and over in his mind.

“I feel crazy,” he whispers finally, feeling hushed. It’s nice here, in the humid dark of Duper’s guest room. The early morning light is just starting to drift through the heavy drapes. If he really concentrates, he can fool himself into thinking that he is just admitting these sad and terrible things to himself in the dark. “I’m always alone and I never used to mind but, I just feel like any day now, I’ll wake up and things will be better, but they aren’t. This is my new normal, and I hate it. I don’t want to feel like this anymore, but I don’t know how to stop.”

“Être tiguidou, Sidney.” Flower says, just as quietly. They aren’t touching anymore, but his weight is a comforting presence on the opposite side of the bed. “It’s not just something people say, it sucks now, but it will pass. These things always do, you know?”

Sidney breathes out heavily, forcing himself to take those deep breaths and feel calm. His first, instinctive reaction is anger. It’s a shit thing to say, this too shall pass, it’s just bullshit. Mario said it and Kayla said it and now Flower is saying it. But, being bullshit doesn’t mean it isn’t true, is the thing. It is better, that’s the truth. It is getting better and while that’s largely because he’s done things to make it better, it doesn’t change the fact that time and distance, and maybe shutting down his google alert for Geno’s name has made things better.

“I took the google alert off his name,” Sid starts, accidentally cutting Flower off when he starts to speak. “Oh, sorry, no, um, you.” They stutter around each other.

“Have you talked to him?” Flower asks after a beat, spitting it out quick.

Sid stifles a groan into a heavy sigh, wanting to roll over and bury his face in the pillows, maybe suffocate himself a bit at the very thought of making that call. But he’s trying to be marginally more adult than he was last night and… the rest of the summer, so. “Yeah, no, I mean, I will, for sure. I have to. So I will.”

For a second, he thinks they might leave it there, Flower gnawing on his lip, nodding absently but clearly wanting to say something more and Sid wanting to both continue whining piteously and end the conversation right here. “A google alert? Really?”

“Oh my god, fuck off!” He really does roll over then, stealing all the blankets to wrap them around himself like a cocoon as Flower laughs.

  
  


**(August 2014)**

It’s just a Barnes and Noble. Sidney repeats that to himself as many times as he can stomach on the way there, fingers drumming nervously on the steering wheel. Just a regular Barnes and Noble, at eight am on a Tuesday. There is no reason to believe that he’ll encounter anyone but helpful employees. It’s not that Sid hates people, not really. It’s just, after years of the media circus surrounding him, over eager fans and camera phone pictures that aren’t as subtle as they think, paparazzi all crowding and circling assuming they know him from the ‘slices of life,’ PR videos, he’s just tired, is all. Sid really doesn’t want his coffee order posted on the internet, or have millions of people wondering why he prefers 2% milk. It’s none of their business and it’s largely the reason he now does most of his shopping online and gets his groceries delivered.

The parking lot is just as empty as he thought it would be, so it’s nothing to park close to the entrance, tug his sunglasses and ball cap on and run in. He hasn’t been in an actual book store in a few years, not since his mother got a kindle for Christmas, at least. When the electric doors slide open, the atmosphere makes him pause to take it all in and, okay, marvel a little. He’s seen, in movies and shows, the movement of making popular chain stores ‘homey’ and not at all like a chain store, but it’s sort of a smack in the face in reality. Deep brown and cream leather couches frame the small coffee shop in the corner where the barista’s still setting up noisily. Small kitschy wax burners shaped like owls and trees are at home in small wall alcoves emitting a warm glow scented with apples and cinnamon. Sid breathes deep, already making a mental note to add wax burners to his furnishings list and wondering if apple pie might be the perfect first thing to make in the new kitchen. He’s not sure where the tradition came from, if it’s old or new, but his mother always says cooking something sweet in a new kitchen brings good luck.

The displays are nice enough, he decides, moving closer, eye-catching but not in-the-way or obnoxiously big. Staff picks, new reads, classics, bestsellers and finally, bestselling series. He’s read _Harry Potter_ start to finish, so Sid skips that, same with _A Series of Unfortunate Events_. He thinks he can get away with bending the rules to ‘the first _new_ book series you see.’ Without Kayla calling him out on cheating. And next in the row is a collection of four black bound novels with unassuming red and white motifs on the spine. None of them are too thick, which means they shouldn’t be too challenging to get through and they’re in the best sellers list so they should at least be good. He’s got the set up and in his hands before the actual name of the series pops out at him. _Twilight_ , _New Moon_ , _Eclipse_ and _Breaking Dawn_ , by Stephenie Meyer.

Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck a duck.

He has them in his hands, so even if he puts them down and picks up the next row, Kayla will know. She has crazy mom senses and he will get no end of shit. He’s going to get no end of shit anyway if any of the guys ever find out he’s read them, but that pales in comparison to Kayla bringing it up months or, he wouldn’t put it past her to bring it up years later; “Hey, remember how you were too chicken shit to read Twilight. Like your balls would shrivel up and fall off if you opened the cover or something? Remember that?”

It’s not like he’s the first NHL player to have shitty taste.

“They’re on the bestseller list,” he mutters to himself, squaring his shoulders and approaching the front desk. “They can’t be bad.” The woman bending to type on one of the computers behind the counter is tall, wow is she tall. Sid is not short by any means, but he feels small next to the woman whose name tag reads Josie – Store Manager.

She glances slightly up, not meeting Sid’s eyes but acknowledging his presence with a polite customer-smile. “Hey, sorry we’re, uh…” Her pale eyes flick back up freezing on Sid’s face and her smile slowly curls into something less forced and a lot more flirty. “Not quite open yet.”

She straightens to her full height and Sid is forced to revise his first impression of ‘wow she’s tall,’ to ‘wow she’s attractive.’ Sid has a thing for people who can handle his strength or maybe even throw him around a little. Sue him. Josie looks to be a little older than Sid, with laugh lines and wrinkles in her earthy brown skin and grey peppering her thick black hair. “Oh! Geez, I’m so sorry, the doors were open, so I, um. Should I leave?”

“Not at all,” Josie winks, plucking the box from Sid easily and removing the security tag. “though it might take a second for the system to finish booting up, so you’ll have to suffer through my presence for a little longer. Gift for, hm, no ring, girlfriend then? Pestering you to read her favourite series?”

“No, no, uh, no girlfriend. It’s for a bet.” Sid ducks his head, lips pressing together to fight the ridiculous grin that wants spread. Normally he would consider being hit on in public unprofessional at best and offensive at worst, but it’s been a while. More than a while since he’s been hit on at all, or had any special company that wasn’t silicone.

Over his head, Josie scoffs. “For a bet? Come on, man, that’s like ‘dog ate my homework,’ levels of bad. What’s next? Are you just holding it for a friend?”

“No!” Sid gives up entirely on trying not to giggle, it’s all in the fucking delivery, voice dropping low and leaning in like they were sharing a serious secret. “I’ve been told I need more hobbies, so my friends dared me to read all of the first series I saw.”

“And it was _Twilight_ , that’s so sad.” Josie sighs, shaking her head in over-the-top dismay.

“Is it really that bad?” Sid has to ask incredulously. He knows that Caleb has capital letter Opinions on Stephenie Meyer and he knows that Taylor read through it all one summer, shutting herself in her room and alternating between crying and tying up the phone line to have hours long conversations about it with her friends. And if Taylor’s read it, he can pretty much guarantee his mom has too, and he remembers seeing the books kicking around the Lemieux household a couple years ago, but never ventured to pick them up and leaf through.

“Well, that’s going to be up to you. Personally, I don’t like the narrative structure, and I believe that if the narrator and the protagonist are one in the same, that their actions should drive the plot along. But that’s just me. As a plus, they aren’t that in-depth or long, I mean, you could have picked up Game of Thrones, that would be a commitment and a half.” She nods, almost to herself, and that’s how Sid ends up wasting an hour at the counter of Barnes and Noble, tying up the Store Manager’s attention and having the most in-depth discussion about books he’s had since leaving Shattuck. Sid gets rung up as they are kicked out of the cashier’s area when the part timer staff comes in, leaving them both standing awkwardly by the novelties and gift section. Sid shifts awkwardly from foot to foot, conscious suddenly of how much Josie’s been flirting with him, and the lack of counter between them. He’s thinking of making his excuses and leaving when she reaches out casually to cup his elbow. “Hey, tell me if I’m reading this wrong here, but would you like to go out sometime?”

He draws a breath to say, ‘no, thanks but no thanks.’ Or something similar, but what hiccups out of him, shy and quiet rather than apologetic, is his phone number, instead.

He leaves with a box of books and a date for Thursday, and between Mario and Kayla he can’t decide who is more excited.

\---

It’s a horrible date.

 

Not, objectively speaking. They get along well, and there’s no lack of laughter or conversation; Josie even opening the first _Twilight_ book to give a spirited, hilarious reading of the first chapter. Her character voices and exaggerated facial expressions send Sid into gales of honking cackles. It’s probably a good thing it’s the middle of both the week and the afternoon, so the café is pretty empty, so they aren’t disturbing anyone. With one last, theatrical hiccup of emotion, Josie finishes the chapter and closes the book, settling her long legs between Sid’s and knocking their knees together.

Which, really, is the only problem. Josie is kind, solicitous, funny and attractive, but there’s no spark. She hooks one of her feet around Sid’s ankle and there’s no anticipatory, butterflies-puck-about-to-drop nervousness to it. She runs her thumb over Sid’s knuckles when she hands the book back and Sid’s fingers don’t tingle, his breath doesn’t catch, he doesn’t wonder what her hands would feel like on his skin. She’s attractive, but there is no attraction. Sid just ends up feeling disappointed and vaguely guilty about the terrible but kind of inevitable comparisons he keeps making. Josie isn’t Geno and he shouldn’t want her to be, but he does. He wants to be sitting across from Geno, laughing too loud at his jokes, hearing his rough accent that never really smoothed out and listening to the latest gossip from all around the NHL because Geno can’t resist a story.

It’s been months, he should really be past this. He shouldn’t be keeping a tin of loose leaf tea in his cupboards or grabbing the laundry soap he knows Geno prefers or tivo-ing his favourite shows anymore. But he still does and can’t seem to stop himself from making a cup of that tea and leaving it out to perfume the kitchen. It’s stupid and it’s sad and he’s going to stop. Sid said he would be better, and he will. But dating clearly isn’t the right way to do that yet. It’s not fair, not to Josie or to Sid. And maybe not to Geno either.

“I should,” he gestures to his watch a little ruefully, unthinkingly using the few signs in ASL he’s picked up just through observation. It’s one of his favourite idiosyncrasies about Kayla and her family, how they’ll add the most random signs into their conversation. He was skyping with the girls just two days ago and in the middle of telling him a winding story about her toy bears, Emily started signing ‘bird’ over and over again, because she could see one out the window.

“Oh yeah, let me walk you back to your car,” Josie says, smiling unconcernedly. The walk isn’t far and it seems impolite to refuse, so Sid squares his shoulders and braces himself for an awkward last five minutes where he’ll noncommittal noises and then dodge Josie’s calls. Which is probably why he’s thrown for a loop when they get onto the street and she chirps, “That was fun, we should do that again, but without the ‘date’ bit, yeah?”

“Oh thank God, yes.” Sid gasps out, his body relaxing all at once, like a puppet whose strings have been cut. “Not that, you’re not great! I do really like you and I had a good time.” He rushes to reassure her, even as she laughingly waves him off.

“We just didn’t click, that happens. But I would like to hang out again, without the ‘please, please me,’ expectations.” She punctuates this with a dirty wiggle of her brows.

\-------

“I really don’t want to do this,” Sid whines, knowing he’s whining but unable to stop. It’s probably better to get it all out now before the season starts anyway. He’s nearly thirty and while that means that most of the ‘Sid the Kid,’ jokes have stopped, the media still loves to paint him as a cry-baby.

“You don’t want to surprise Kayla?” Caleb asks distractedly, typing at a smooth pace. He likes for someone to talk to him while he’s writing his articles for _Today’s Parents_. Sid doesn’t really understand it, but Caleb says it helps him concentrate. And on the other side of that, reading _Twilight_ out loud, mockingly, helps Sid get through much of the first book. Because it really is just that bad.

“No, that’s not it, but you’re sure Amal can get these same days off?” he mutters, dithering over the tickets. They’ve already decided when Kayla will come down to help Sid decorate and move in, but this is something extra. He has his own house, a real one, and so he’s going to have his own Thanksgiving too.  The team schedule got emailed out a while ago too, so he knows they have a nice stretch of time at Canadian Thanksgiving. Caleb hums an absent minded affirmative, and keeps humming until Sid gives in and books the flight. It’s not like he can’t shell out the money to pay if he needs to change them last minute, after all. What’s the good with having all this money if you can’t fly your friends down for a surprise Thanksgiving?

“So what don’t you want to do?” Caleb yawns, removing one hand from the keyboard to grab his water but continuing to type, albeit more slowly, with the other.

“I should call him.” Sid should have known better than to think Caleb wouldn’t press it. Being the primary caregiver to twin three-year-olds means he possesses amazing hearing, a seemingly supernatural sense of knowing when you don’t want to talk about something, and the ability to make you do it anyway. Sid’s mostly just glad he doesn’t have to clarify once more who ‘he’ is. It was depressing enough to go through it once, thanks.

“Maybe you should look forward to it, my love. After all,” he interrupts himself to backspace furiously through the paragraph he just wrote, “time can change things. If you haven’t heard from him since May, you’ll have a lot to talk about.”

Normally that makes Sid want to smile until his face hurts, being upgraded to ‘my love,’ in Caleb’s book. That casual Newfie form of address solely reserved for his family and close friends. My love, my duckies, my honey. Normally they make him miss Nova Scotia and east coasters in general something fierce. It grates a little, today, or maybe just this instance. “Yeah, I don’t think so.”  

“And why’s that?”

He spins himself around in his chair a couple times to avoid any pity or sympathy on Caleb’s face. “Because you can’t force someone to love you enough to put you first, is the thing.” He keeps spinning when the keyboard's rhythmic clacking slows and that absent minded hum starts up again. Caleb is trying to wait him out, and the worst thing is, he’ll win, and they both know it. Preternatural patience, that man. “You can’t force someone to be ready, to be serious.”

He’s not sure when his thoughts stopped circling Geno and ran back to the topic that’s been haunting him since he came out to Kayla with a pronoun that slipped off his tongue easy as breathing.

“Is that something you want?” Caleb asks it lightly, without judgment or any indication of his opinion one way or another. Which, yeah okay, is probably why he’s having this conversation with Caleb instead of Amal or Kayla. Sid stops himself, planting his feet and letting his head thump back against the headrest hard. Caleb has nothing in it, nothing riding on it, no expectations, while Kayla has been firmly in the ‘you can do more, but hey it’s your life,’ passive aggressive camp. So much so, Sid’s taken to hanging up on her with extreme prejudice when she brings it up.

“I don’t know. I feel like I could, like maybe I should. It was one of those things I scheduled for ‘after hockey,’” Sid admits, rather ruefully. “but I don’t want to wait anymore. I want to settle down with someone and that someone might be a man. People shouldn’t have to be secrets.” He shrugs halfheartedly, thinking of the birthdays and Christmases and New Year’s spent apart and telling his mom that who he was seeing wasn’t serious enough to bring home. She always gets this hopeful look on her face when she asks him if Sid is bringing anyone back this year, making pointed comments about how big his house is and how settled and ‘grown up,’ he is now. The most telling thing, though, is that when his dad nods approvingly, talking about his successful children who are focusing on their hockey careers, she never says anything. Her mouth will go small and pinched with worry, but she’ll just sigh and hug him a little tighter. The exact same way she did on his short visit after getting back to Canada, when he confirmed for the final time that there would be no one special for Christmas this year.

“Well, anyway, you’ve got some time to think about it.” Caleb clears his throat briskly and Sid smiles. Each and every one of the Singer-Zia family are planners, like him. They like to make a clear and concise strategy for going forward. Step by step. “Call him. You’ve been doing really well lately, moving your life forward and onward, we’re all proud of you. But you need some closure, my love.”

“Yeah, for sure.” Sid starts, nodding automatically. Something that might have been a laugh but was too small comes out of Caleb, like a short hiccup of amused air.

“Think of it as a book, when the story ends suddenly and without warning, it leaves the reader shaken and unnerved. But when all the loose ends are tied up and reader is given closure, they will remember the book fondly.”  

“Yeah? And what if the book ended before I was even halfway through?” he says, sounding small, knowing the metaphor doesn’t make sense but throwing out in spite of it.

Caleb shrugs, unflappable and smiling. “Then I guess you finish the book yourself, hon, and write it however you want to. With new characters, maybe,” he hints unsubtly, pale brows raising in a faux-casual manner that Sid has to cut off quickly.

“I’m not playing for the Leafs,” he says firmly for the hundredth time, rolling his eyes. “I’d like to win another Cup in my lifetime, thanks.”

“Just a suggestion,” Caleb continues, not mad in the slightest that Sid caught him out. “Think of how much less Kayla would nag.”

“No, she would nag just as much, but she would do it at my house so you didn’t have to hear it, you asshole. Way to throw me under the bus.”

“I love her, I have no choice but to listen to her nag and think fond thoughts. You however, chose her. Think on that.”

\----

**(Not finished)**

Flower fucking timed it, Sid knows he did, because he doesn’t get the text until one in the afternoon. It was sent at seven that morning, but Pens’ PR is keeping him on a short leash after his shit show of a summer. He had training, and then a photo shoot and then yet another lunch with the new coach before finally he’s free to grab his phone to bitch about how the lines are being set up and he sees it. _Heads up, G’s back in town._

Fucking Flower.

But it’s not a disaster, Sid has, at least if G just got into town this morning, two days before he’ll feel human enough to attempt English interaction. In past years, those two days were agony, Sid got jittery and snappish waiting, waiting, waiting to see his boyfriend after months of spotty communication. This year he still feels jittery, but mostly he just wants this to be over and done with. Well, mostly he wants it never to have happened at all; he wants, if he’s being honest, to still have this reunion to look forward to. To have Geno croon, a little mockingly, his stupid Russian pet names for Sid, the ones he keeps secret and Sid can’t figure out how to spell so he has no hope of translating. He wants to be folded up into Geno’s arms and kissed everywhere and he wants it so badly and in ways he can’t express.

To put it simply, he wants what he shouldn’t. Sid wants everything he’s been thinking of through a layer of bitterness and anger and self-directed disgust for the entire summer. Nearly half a year should have been more than enough time to lick his wounds and let them heal. But buying a new bed didn’t stop him from wanting someone in it, and changing his life didn’t stop him from missing the way things were.

And with that, two days is not nearly enough time to prepare for Sid for his ex showing up at the crappy apartment he’s renting. Geno looks tired, but so fucking good. He’s tan, and thick. Bulky in the way he is pre-season, his shoulders and arms defined to mouth-watering degrees.

Holy shit. Sid bites his tongue, trying hard to focus on Geno’s face, his hesitant smile and warm eyes and not the way his shorts stretch over his thighs and how much Sid wants to get on his knees and run his hands over them. Sid is not ready for this. He fucked up. He forgot the best thing about Geno coming back from Russia is he always wants reunion sex, and looking like that, he always gets it. Every single time. Even after Sochi.

“Sid!” Geno smiles, edging easily past Sid and throwing his sweater and himself on the terrible red couch. “Flower tell me you move, is small and horrible, I see now when you need downsize.”

Geno seems fine.

Sid isn’t a horrible person, logically he knows that Geno is going to be fine, he proved that over the summer, but, still. A small, mean part of him wants Geno to be just as affected as he is. It would prove that he took the relationship just as seriously, or that he missed what they had. But no, that’s just Sid. Sucking in a tight breath, Sid takes a second to lean against the front door. This something he has to do, not being okay is not an option. He can’t be on a team without Geno, he can’t play hockey, Pens hockey, without Geno. Sid has to be okay. Full stop. He just needs a moment, just a couple seconds to press his knuckles against his stinging eyes and indulge the stupid way his face his twisting and his breath won’t come easy.

“Sid?” Geno calls, tentative in a way he isn’t normally. He’s making an effort, Sid reminds himself. Geno is trying to get back to common ground, the very least he can do is try.

“Just a second, I’m going to grab a drink, do you want anything?” There, that’s a moderately normal answer.

“You know.” He says shortly, and Sid blinks for an uncomfortable second, having to parse that and think of just when he stopped speaking Geno’s English as a second language.

Tea would be the cowards way out. Using the special loose leaf he still has because he is a parody of a person, waiting for the water to boil and fixing a tray. It would feel too much like he was trying to pacify, to soften the blow.

He grabs some waters instead.

“I’m sorry.” He says, first thing, taking a seat in the chair across the coffee table and not snuggling under the arm G left laid over the top of the course. “I should have called. I was being selfish and that is on me. We need to talk about the break up and how if affects the team and I put it off. That was wrong of me.”

He blows out a big breath, feeling better now that it’s off his chest and chances a look up.

  
The last time he saw that look on Geno's face they'd lost their chance at the Stanley Cup. 

(Sid apologizes again for bringing it up, talks a lot in this scene. Geno can't bring himself to speak here, too worried his voice will break so he let's Sid go off about needing space and not being over it yet but promising to work harder. Sid says they should try and be friends. Sid, himself doesn't know if it's possible, but Sid would do just about anything for hockey so. Geno gets out of there asap. Sid stops him at the door to remind him to take his sweater. Geno is always leaving things at Sid's place. Proof he belongs, that it's his space too. Geno, for his part, feels that Sid's homes have always been too pretty, to picturesque. He feels like he needs to carve out a messy space for himself there.) 

\----

He’s not sure what he’s expecting, after that. But, like a healing bruise or getting slammed into the boards, Geno is just another part of Sid’s life that he has to suck in enough air to breath and skate on. Their recovering friendship is awkward. Geno avoids being alone with him or meeting his eyes and Sid can’t focus on fixing them because he’s getting close to the end of his lease at the terrible apartment and second and third floors of the house are almost done enough to move in and Sid wants to be in his house, yesterday. Hedley keeps sending updates on the secret third floor specs he took great lengths to keep from Kayla, the Pens PR wants him to do a tour of the new place because somehow the fans got a hold of it, and Kayla is flying in today after morning skate to start shopping for the furniture for all the rooms. It’s been five months and it figures that Sid would start to feel stressed and overwhelmed at the end of his project instead of the beginning.

He’s rushing, which is why he pockets his phone after morning skate without checking the time, or his messages.

“Sweetheart!” A cloying voice calls from the right as he stumbles out of the changing room. He whips to the side, gobsmacked to see Kayla with big movie star sunglasses on the top of her head and what must be professional, meeting-with-clients wear, leaning against the concrete wall easy as you please. “Hi, sweetie. You know when you said, ‘skate in the morning, with optional skate in the afternoon,’ I thought, oh good, he’ll meet me at the airport. Because: optional.”

“I’m sorry! I thought you’d get a rental car. Wait, when did you get in?” Her flight was supposed to land at one, which left him enough time to get to the airport, Sid knows because he checked it probably thirty times.

“I got bumped up a flight, I texted you that.” she shrugs, grinning like an asshole. “And why would I need a car? I don’t drive, I live in Toronto.”

“You live in the suburb, that’s not Toronto.”

Kayla sneers, swaying her head from side to side snottily. “That’s like saying: ‘You live in Nova Scotia, that’s not Canada.’”

  
  


…….

(Same scene, just a little later. I would probably rework this to be a little more subtle but I wanted the border-line mean 'things only your friends can get away with saying to you' bits)

“Sidney,” and whoa, does that ever make Sid sit up straight, because Kayla, as a rule, calls Sid ‘sweetie,’ as if it is actually his name. “This. Is. What. I. Do. For. A. Living.” She carefully signs out each word as she says it, her eyes never leaving Sid’s, and when he looks suitably contrite, she moves on. “I’ve been here since seven, I’ve already had three cups of coffee, been to the house, spoken to Hedley and your ‘secret attic project,’ is nowhere near as secret as you think it is and we will talk about that, but first: it’s beautiful, Hedley and his team and worth every penny. Now look at this charming kitchen nook I found on the buy and sell facebook page, it’s made of old church pews and the wood will complement the existing oak wonderfully.”

She’s right, he loves it. He loves that the seats open and that it’s a perfect right angle and will fit into the corner of his kitchen and that the wood will match. He loves that it reminds him of his grandmother and the Sunday mornings he didn’t have practice. It reminds him of Christmas mass and choir practice before it interfered with hockey.

“So,” she starts, shifting around and looking as uncomfortable as he’s ever seen her. The Pen’s media crew is squished into the back of the Pen’s corporate vehicle they’ve been given to do all the running around today. She drums her fingers along the hard plastic of the door, lacquered nails grating on Sid’s nerves. This is absolutely not how he wanted to do this, not how he wanted to greet his friend, but Jen’s right, he’s been, if not skipping, then at least lacking on his media commitments in favor of working on his home. “Are you dating?”

“No!” Sid snaps, flicking his eyes to her and then to the rear-view, where the camera crew is still just setting up. “Why?”

“Why not? It’s been a couple months, I thought you might have met someone.” She seems determined to fake casual until she makes it, fingers still drumming but otherwise unruffled carrying on their conversation as if over skype.

Sid winces, feeling amazingly grateful for Jen and their PR crew, who will cut any and all things he’s uncomfortable with out. “No, I just want to focus on getting my ducks in a row."

Kayla rolls her eyes exuberantly. “What the hell does that even mean?” she complains, messing around with her clipboard and phone. “Okay, so, to continue this line, I have to ask, are you,” and Sid has to glance over again, as she carefully signs the word ‘out,’ and sigh and nod. It’s sort of an open secret, never really mattered until he started dating Geno, and even then, wasn’t something the managers were worried about. At least, they never said anything. Mario never said anything, but then he wouldn’t, so the managers were probably worried, but not where he could see them.

“Alright, then understand what I am saying now, I am saying as a friend, and someone who’s been there: dick is mediocre and plentiful.”

“Yes. Thank you, Kayla,” Sid says tightly. Anyway that ends this part of the conversation, the one that equals Get Over It. “I am aware. Look, what am I supposed to do, pretend the last two years didn’t happen? I know I kind of fell apart this summer,” ignoring, he is ignoring her mutter of _you don’t say_ , “but my attention has to be on the team right now and I just want to get back to focusing on hockey.” There, that is a safe, media ready answer.

“What the hell, you were together for two years? I know we never really talked about it, but seriously, do you want to talk about it?” Kayla turns halfway, the pleather seat squeaking under her body. “Cause, and I know there is a huge difference between how you actually are and how you present yourself, don’t get me wrong, but there are literally about twenty articles on your pending retirement. You broke ‘Sidney Crosby’s Routines’, and that is huge for ‘Public Sidney’.” Good lord, she even uses finger quotes.

Flicking the turn signal almost viciously, Sid takes his time answering, well aware of the media people following everything in the back. “Right, I forgot I’m not allowed to have preferences, make my own decisions or outwardly express any emotion but earnest ambition,” he growls, more than a little bitter, before locking all that down and bringing out his PR face. “You know I guess what it all comes down to is we tried something new, and as a team, as a line, it just didn’t sync up. But the important part and the takeaway here is that we’re working through it and ready to try again.”

“Stop that, that’s not what I meant.”

“Well what?”

“I want to know if you’re okay! Jesus, Sid, you’re my friend. I just want to know if you’re okay.”

“Quit biting your nails in my car, that’s disgusting.”

“I’m sorry, you’re an NHL player, you spit on the ice and share one Gatorade bottle per bench, you don’t get to say shit about disgusting habits.”

\----

(not finished)

**September 2014**

 

He starts going with Josie to the local animal shelter for two reasons. The first is to take pictures of the cats and dogs and send them to Kayla to show the girls. Caleb is allergic and Amal just doesn’t like animals, so the pictures are the closest thing the girls are going to get to a pet until they’re older. The second is because after their disastrous attempt at a date and the slow, stilted transition into friends, Josie runs headfirst into a man she describes as: a breathtaking beauty, a virtuous volunteer, Sidney, you have to help me, be my wingman, you’re my only hope!

It took Sid a smidge too long to understand that she flirts like she breathes. That her crooning compliments and the proprietary way she herds Sid around with a hand on his elbow or shoulder blade is not an awkward attempt at more dates, but just the way she is with people she likes. Sid got it eventually, it just took a while. He likes to have clear-cut relationships. Friends, family, teammates: those are simple labels with clear social conduct attached to each one. Josie didn’t really fit any of them, at first. One date doesn’t constitute Dating or Girlfriend, and they skipped the Friend stage to go on that date. To be honest, Sid wasn’t planning on seeing her ever again, already had plans to go to the B&N a couple streets over next time, or hell, make the drive to the one in Homestead. And, if accepting the many and generous offers of Josie’s company (his words) were not a convenient and easy way to avoid Sid’s well-meaning but nosy teammates, they probably wouldn’t be Friends.

But, thanks to her many efforts, they are, and he finds that he genuinely likes Josie. Where before, his time was filled with Kayla and the house, Kayla and training, it’s now filled with Kayla and Josie and hockey. Josie takes him to group movie nights with her friends, she takes him to her weekly stitch-and-bitch knitting circle - Sid has been delegated to holding the yarn and only to holding the yarn - she is teaching him to play the guitar. Josie is a pretty great person and if there were even an ounce of sexual attraction there, Sid would happily date her. There isn’t, so now it only looks to outsiders like they’re dating. Which in retrospect, makes Sid a pretty shitty wingman. But he promised, and saying "I can’t stay out late, I have to volunteer in the morning, sorry,” Is a much better way to beg off of team celebrations than, “I don’t want to sit in a booth by myself while my ex gets drunk and macks on other people.”

Which, okay, isn’t fair. It’s not true and it’s not fair. Geno is very responsible when everyone goes out. He deserves better than abject bitterness from Sid, he does. Sid’s just not sure he can be less bitter about Geno making cow eyes at him and very politely, civil and restrained, asking questions about Sid’s New Girlfriend. The one he doesn’t have. Because his ‘New Girlfriend,’ is Jo and they aren’t dating. Not even a little.

(Enter Dustin, Josie’s new boyfriend)

 

**(October 2014)**

 

Thanksgiving day dawns bright and warm, well, Sid thinks it’s warm. October in Pittsburgh is much like June in Nova Scotia, albeit with more rain. The normal creaks and groans of the house expanding, waking up, are made that much louder from his guests waking up and readying for the day a head. Kayla and her band got in yesterday, driving the whole five hours and making it just after Sid himself got home, giving him enough time to unwrap and make the child-sized guest beds, thankfully. From the kitchen he can hear them rattling around upstairs, filling his house with the sounds of people and family and home that are desperately missing. He sighs quietly, bumping his hip against the counter a couple times as he goes through the motions of making coffee. The butcher block countertops have a wider lip than he’s used to and he hasn’t quite stopped hitting himself with them yet.

Sid has some half-hearted thoughts about getting slippers after a third shiver runs down his spine from walking on the chilly tiles, but ultimately he likes the texture too much to bother. After the fight he put up about turning the entire top floor into his master, he let Kayla have her way with the kitchen with his only request being _no yellow_ , and he’s not too proud to admit she did a great job. He thought she was going to replace the existing hardwood, but she took it one step further, choosing Italian-made white, hexagonal tiles with dark grout for the floor, and using a matching oak for the countertops. Paired with the dark gray-blue cabinets, stainless steel appliances and beige backsplash, Sid was fully prepared to hate his kitchen, and instead it’s become one of the most used areas of the house. He often curls up with cushions in the nook to read in the warm afternoon light.

Sid sways to the side as Caleb lumbers in, yawning widely and not awake enough to do more than grunt while staring pathetically at the coffee pot just beginning to sputter. Taking pity on him, Sid decides to start breakfast, willfully ignoring the text demanding he wait for Dustin and Josie to get here. But Dustin likes to kick Sid out of his own kitchen and he has to learn why that is unacceptable. Besides, Dustin is very likely going to take over the second guests start to arrive and Sid has to be the host instead of hiding in his kitchen.

It’s his own fault, really. Duper was moaning about cooking for his entire brood and in-laws because it was his turn this year, and Sid just happened to mention that he was looking forward to testing out his mother’s recipes on his own this year. Which, of course, lead to the French Canadian Inquisition.

No one ever expects the Inquisition.

Particularly ones led by meddlesome French Canadians whose love and support comes in the form of concern and disapproval.

He managed, finally to extract himself from not one, but several French conversations both involving him and taking place around him to be waylaid by Beau asking what he should bring, to the Team Thanksgiving that Sidney is Hosting, apparently.

Say what you will about French Canadians, those fuckers are organized and very good at misdirection. Before he left practice that day, not only did he have a list of every teammate coming, but also what and whom they're going to be bringing. (It’s not the whole team. It’s not even a quarter of the team, it’s basically just the ones without wives, girlfriends or family close by.)

A list that includes Geno, of course, because Sid still has a fucking heart and he's been working really hard at being okay, okay?

 

\------

“So, when did you learn you like boys?” Josie asks, not meanly, just curious and bold in the way that a couple glasses of wine can make someone. She’s claimed the corner of his sectional and seems to be holding court over the rookies. Beau and the rest who heard her turn to look to Sid, and yeah she must be talking to him, only Dustin must think the same thing because they both say, ‘boarding school,’ one after the other.

“Sleep overs, right?” He grins, nudging Sid’s shoulder with his own. Boxing him in against Josie a little more. “Because watching porn together and critiquing your buddy's grip isn't gay. Not at all.”

“It’s not gay if your balls don’t touch and you don’t meet each other’s eyes in the morning.” Sid nods sagely, taking a long pull of his beer in lieu of looking at the horrified faces of his rookies.

“If there’s a full moon and Mars is in retrograde,” Dustin laughs, eyes crinkling fondly. “Man, I dated so many confused straight kids and in the closet gay boys, I didn’t even know I liked girls until I graduated.”

“How? How is that possible that no one snuck girls in?” Bortz scoffs, waving his current girlfriend over. Her name might be Katie, but may also be Carly.

“Well, you could either risk getting expelled or suspended for sneaking a girl in, or you could tell your dorm dad that Steve is going to be staying over because you both really need to study for next week’s exam.” Dustin says, so calm and reasonable that Sid can’t help but keep nodding along, because yeah, that’s pretty much exactly how it goes. It’s not gay if you’re drunk, and what happens at hockey camp, or World Juniors or the Olympics….

\------

**(not finished)**

 

In his defense, he doesn’t plan it. It’s not like he meant to get trapped in the study. He agrees fully with Kayla, it would be fucking stupid to fuck the ex you’re still in love with, disastrous really, no matter how good he looks when he smiles and his eyes crinkle at the corners or how his dress shirt stretches across his shoulders… And now that Sid knows about all the intervening his wonderful friends are doing he does his best to help them. He willingly goes to whatever room they nudge him towards and joins large groups of conversation instead of lingering on the edges of the party and escaping often to the kitchen like he originally planned. But Caleb is wrong, he’s talking out his ass when it comes to the narrative style of _The Virgin Suicides_ , and Sid will prove it, if he can just find the fucking book.

He half turns to look over his shoulder when the floorboards creak, about to tell Caleb to fuck off because it’s here somewhere but his breath catches in his throat and his eyes helplessly follow the long line of Geno’s back as he shuts the door behind him. Well shit, he is unfortunately just as attractive as he was five minutes ago, but at least this time he doesn’t have a dark haired little girl on his hip, which helps Sid’s resistance somewhat. “Hey,” Sid croaks out, forcing  a shaky smile. “It was good of you to come.”

Geno scrubs a hand through his hair the way he does when he's nervous. "Yes, is good party, Sid." He is still standing right in front of the door, so it's not like Sid can just shoulder him out of the way and get to someplace with more people where he won't want to stand closer or grab Geno's hand and squeeze.

He shifts his weight awkwardly from foot to foot, waiting for Geno to say something more and fighting not to hunch his shoulders or put his hands in his pockets. Either of those actions would be too telling, and anyway, they've both tried to be easy with each other since the season started and have mostly succeeded. It's a lot like their rookie year, leaning on their teammates and focusing more on hockey than friendships, but Sid's not about to ruin what little progress they have. He would hand in the C first. But nothing comes, which is just so typical of their relationship off the ice. Geno seeking Sid out just to say nothing at all is a pretty good explanation of their entire relationship, really. In play, Geno ruthlessly takes advantage of any opening or weakness, they communicate almost effortlessly when skating together, and it's good. It's so good. They just couldn’t make that follow through and it's probably what ended up breaking them. Sid sighs quietly and tries to ignore the guilty twitch that jumps across Geno’s face at the noise.

“I’m sorry.” Sid jumps, and would rear back if not for the book case behind him. Geno doesn’t ever apologize, he never admits he’s wrong, even when he knows he is. He makes up for bad behavior by buying people things, or in their case, attempting to curb whatever behavior they were fighting about. “I’m not knowing how to do this,” he admits, mouth drawn tightly.

“How to do what?” Sid’s voice comes out small and hopeful and he has to jerk his eyes away from Geno’s, not wanting to see the look on his face.

“Missing you. I’m missing you all the time, Sid, please. I’m not understand why, we break like always and when I come back, you decide you not want us. Return all things, say need space.” And Sid has to cut him off right there. Can’t stand another second of that confused, lying tone.

“Me? I decided?” He demands, a little incredulous, a lot furious. “You walked out of my life without saying goodbye and expected me to be okay with that; how was I supposed be okay with that? What else was I supposed to think when you stopped talking to me?" He hates the way his voice breaks but has to continue then, quieter, more defeated. "I just wish you would have told me you stopped loving me, instead of -"

“Is not true! Always I am loving you! Always I am wanting you and you say, camera, you say media, you say team.” Geno snaps, throwing his arms around in agitation and Sid sucks in a sharp breath, feeling his face screw up the way it does when he’s trying not to shout or cry. “I’m wanting you and you make all rules! I’m just follow, way I always do, any way I can until you change rules.”

“Don’t you fucking dare put this all on me. You want me until you don’t. Until it’s not easy, or convenient, and then you pull away without telling me anything.” Sid stops himself there, working his jaw until the hinge clicks uncomfortably and he feels less like saying unfair, borderline cruel things. Until he can swallow his pride enough to actually think through what Geno’s saying. “I never said that. I never said I wanted it to be casual, or that I wanted to break up during the off season. I never said that.”

Geno scoffs, “Not have to.”

Sid was wrong before, this right here is what broke them. “You can’t just assume I want something. That’s not how it works.” He lets himself sag against the bookcase, uncaring of the sharp edges pressed all along his back. Sid’s exhausted suddenly, tired of fighting to be okay, both on his own and then again with Geno on the team, and he’s tired of feeling like he’s off kilter trying to find his balance at work, at home, with friends. “This doesn’t work. Maybe it never did.”

“Sid, I’m love you, still. I’m want it to work.” Geno edges closer, his tall, gangly limbs folded and hunched to make himself seem smaller.

“No, you.” He huffs, biting his tongue to stop himself from finishing that sentence. “I don’t know if I want that.”

“What I’m do, Sid? Tell me. I’m want. I’m in this, with us.”

“I don’t know!” With some effort, Sid claws his voice back down to normal volume. “Come on, Geno. We had problems even before all this. You’re right. I was worried about the media and the team, but I never said I wanted to be apart on the off season.”

“Okay,” Geno reaches out like he can’t help himself, grabbing at Sid’s hand and trying to draw him closer bridge the distance between them. “Okay we have problem, we fix. I’m promise.”

“You said you loved me and then you fucked off to Russia and were with other people. I found out through Deadspin, G. I don’t know if that’s something I can work through.” Geno lets go of him abruptly, stepping back like Sid hit him.

“You said,” he starts hollowly, licking his lips. “You said media, not being safe. I was just making it safe.”

“By kissing other people and not talking to me about it?”

(Sid leaves)

….

“What you want?” Geno snarls, but it can’t be directed at Sid, who’s around the corner still, slinking back to apologize, to find some way for them both to be a team again. “You get wish, he not want me, he not love me, what you want?”

 

"Don't be an idiot," Kayla shoots back. "He's been in love with you since before I've known him. Sure he was hurting and very mad, but he still loved you. That's why he was hurting and mad." and steals the breath from Sid’s lungs with that short pronouncement. She sighs then, her heels clicking across the floors until the heavy brocade love seat she bought and settled in there creaks under her weight. “You know, I haven’t spoken to my parents for five years?”

Sid should leave, this is clearly a private conversation between them that Sid is not needed or wanted for. He should go.

He doesn’t.

“So?” Geno prompts her when she leaves it at that. He still sounds aggressive but also curious, like when he plays Mario Kart with the guys and understands he’s being insulted but not how or why.

Sid can just barely hear her, speaking in a low, calm voice completely removed from the story she’s telling. “I came out before Amal and I got married. It’s a long story that ends with me not going home for Thanksgiving and my older brother calling me to let me know not to contact them again.” Geno inhales sharply, making a rough, angry noise in the back of his throat, one Sid wants to echo.

“I got off lucky. I was fully my own person when it happened. I was responsible for my own apartment and car and debts. They didn’t call me names, or suggest I’m going to hell, didn’t insult Amal, they just did what was easiest for everybody, I guess.”

“Why you tell me this?” Geno’s voice, even at a normal volume, sounds loud against Kayla’s quiet, stilted one. Sid, ridiculously, holds his breath for the answer. It’s possibly the only thing that keeps him from jumping out of his skin and giving himself away when a small hand grips his shoulder. Amal stands just as silently as him, her thick brows drawn down in a disappointed glare.

“Because whatever your damage is, commitment, being gay or being out — I get it. It’s fucking scary, but I can promise you that what, or whomever you lose for loving Sid, won’t be missed, not in the long run. Amal is my family, my wife and half of the very best parts of me.” Whatever Kayla might say next, or Geno might reply is lost when Amal tugs, just once but sharply and walks away, leaving no choice but to follow.

Unlike her wife or even Caleb, Amal doesn’t touch him, no courteous or possessive hand on his elbow, shoulder blade or the small of his back. She doesn’t even look back to make sure that he’s following. But it’s abundantly clear that in the event he does not follow, she will make him. When they get to the kitchen there is tea on the table and Caleb fussing with stuffing, it’s all painfully obvious that this entire thing, Kayla and Geno in the study and Sid flanked by Caleb and Amal in the kitchen, was choreographed. He sits down heavily at his charming kitchen nook and picks up the fucking tea because there is no point in doing anything else.

The thing about them, all three of them, being in the type of relationship that they are is that they’re all scary good at both communicating and forcing other people to get on their level. Sid breathes in slowly, sucking in the sweet, almost smoky steam off the cup before taking a sip. The tea is perfect, if a little fussy for tea, because of course it is. Not that Sid doesn’t like fancy tea, just that, well, like all east coast Canadians he’s much more comfortable with the bargain brand bags his mom would buy on sale. Tea is much more of a social thing or a comfort thing to Sid. Not feeling well? Make a pot of tea. Are people coming over? Make a pot of tea.

“You shouldn’t have heard that.” Amal finally says sharply, taking a knife and cutting carrots in the sure, decisive way she does everything. Her knife hitting the block in rhythmic, angry snaps. Sid shrinks in on himself, thinking of all the times he fervently wished he could be assertive and demanding off the ice, like Amal. He wished that before all her intensity and drive for excellence was focused on him. Now, he’s as off-footed and intimidated as he’s ever been in her company.

“I know,” he mumbles into his tea, not wanting to meet her eyes. “I know, I just can’t believe she never told me that."

“Why would she? It’s as much my story to tell as hers.”

 

\---

 

The end scene of this fic was meant to be a short, sweet scene at the end of the night with Geno and Sid both tucking Cagney and Emily in to sleep. The kids force their voices to stay low and level, Sid talks about how he isn’t sure he wants to try again with Geno because he wants to focus on starting a family.

Geno is hurt by this. He always knew Sid wanted kids but Sid never told him how much he wanted kids, how serious he was. He wants a chance to try again, to do it right. He wants a life with Sid.

They share one sweet kiss and decided to try a date. A real date.

Geno compliments the house.

Sid thanks him, “It was a lot of necessary work, but I think it’s better for it in the end.”

 

END

 


End file.
